As a whiny OSU fan allow me to say that Oregon and Stanford are both given undue validity in the rankings, and the PAC 12 is as equally crappy as the Big 10. Oregon's legitimacy outside their own conference can only be traced to a single win over a pretty mediocre Tennessee team.

Then you look at Stanford with a loss to an unranked Utah. Compare with Michigan St which also has a single loss to a ranked team and finds themselves well out of the top ten. Injustice I say!

MayoSlather:As a whiny OSU fan allow me to say that Oregon and Stanford are both given undue validity in the rankings, and the PAC 12 is as equally crappy as the Big 10. Oregon's legitimacy outside their own conference can only be traced to a single win over a pretty mediocre Tennessee team.

Then you look at Stanford with a loss to an unranked Utah. Compare with Michigan St which also has a single loss to a ranked team and finds themselves well out of the top ten. Injustice I say!

But it's not the problem with the rankings. It's the fact that preseason rankings are half based on what people think of the schools' reputations. (Yes, my favorite team is probably the poster children for it, but still.)

So given that I'm sitting in Palo Alto at my desk watching entirely full trains head into the station and entirely empty trains leave the station, why do we have Thursday night college football games again?

I feel like I haven't adequately alerted people to the jaw-dropping lunacy of Indiana games this season, and for that I apologize and would like to make amends immediately. Indiana games feature 79.8 points per game between the two teams, which is what happens when you have a great offense and a stunningly inept defense. Here are some Indiana scores, all from this season: 73-35 (W), 41-35 (L), 63-47 (L). 42-39 (L). The Hoosiers scored 28 points on Missouri and Michigan State, both the most either team has given up this season. Now Illinois comes to town, and while Illinois hasn't won a Big Ten game in years, it's totally capable of getting into a bazooka fight with the Hoosiers. Seriously, this one could get fun. #CHAOSTEAM forever.